HOUSTON (Sept. 16, 1984)--Two youths were killed, and three were injured late last night when their car hit a guard rail and overturned on Highway 15.

Police said the five young men, all students at Rice University, were returning from a fraternity party at rival Texas A&M when the accident occurred.

The youths had evidently been drinking, and empty beer cans were found in the wreckage, a police spokesman said.

Two of the youths were pronounced dead on the scene and a third was rushed into surgery at Houston Memorial Hospital. Hospital officials were withholding the victims' names pending notification of their families.

* * *

The last time I saw Ike was one year ago, almost to the day. We had grown up together. We skipped religious school together. We went to high school together. We hung out together. We weren't the closest, but we shared the same friends.

That August night, we found ourselves in the usual place, amid familiar company. As the summer of 1984 drew to a close, Ike and I sat sipping Michelobs, watching cable T.V., critiquing videos, and reminiscing in Rich's basement. Rich, Neil and Mike were also there, of course. Everything was as it always had been.

We grumbled about the rapid approach of the coming school year, which would soon scatter us across the country. No one realized it was the last time we'd all be together that summer. And no one suspected that we'd be reunited within a month--for a funeral.

One year earlier, before we went away to college for the first time, we had gone out for a final celebration. That evening ended with the Rocky Horror Picture Show and a slightly buzzed Ike behind the wheel of his parents' Plymouth Volare (He had cracked up his own GTO a few months earlier. Miraculously, he had escaped injury, unless you count his father's wrath.)

Ike always had been a little reckless. He was an exceptionally smart kid, but he took few things seriously. He was in rare form the day we took the Scholastic Aptitude Test. The Proctor gave us a five-minute break between sections, but Ike stayed in the hall for 15 minutes. He took the test again and managed to impress the admissions people at Rice.

One year at college saw a startling metamorphosis. Ike spoke enthusiastically about his politics courses, and a disciplined exercise regimen had added a good 30 pounds of muscle to his slight frame. He looked healthy. He seemed happy. He spent much of last summer doing what he enjoyed most satling on his family's boat.

And when the vacation ended, we parted without a word.

* * *

It was after 1:00 a.m. when the telephone shook Ike's father from a sound sleep that September morning. The anonymous voice of a Texas state trooper came over the line through 2000 miles of static.

"It's all over." the voice said. "It's all over. Your son is dead."